The Stark Super-Extraordinary Survival Infinity Playlist
Like Clockwork
6 am is not my favorite hour of the day. However, it is the personal favorite hour of our eldest. He likes to share his favorite things with others, so we have seen the hour of 6 am a lot recently.
There has been one rhythm that has helped me considerably through these early mornings in the past weeks, and I want to share it with you. Trying to minimize the amount of early morning scrolling I do on the phone, I try my best to get fairly quickly to the Bible app of my phone, and listen to an audio reading of the Psalm of the day a couple times, working through the collection daily in chronological order, reading along if I am in a stationary spot (ie using the toilet).
Honestly, in those moments, I am groggy and grumpy and grunting. I am not yet primed for meditating the depths of poetry about God and humanity and life. But when are we? However, over the past few months, I have recently started taking an extra step in the pondering of these psalms that has been very helpful to me.
Introducing…the Stark Super-Extraordinary Survival Infinity Psalm Playlist!
Every day I search Spotify for the psalm du jour and add about 4 or 5 musical versions/adaptations of the psalm lyrics to a playlist. Then as I empty the dishwasher and prepare the kiddos’ breakfast, I listen to today’s portion of the playlist. What a game changer!
Some of the songs are thoughtful, fantastic renditions. Some are cheesy or silly, with plenty of iffy artistic decisions. However, hearing an uptempo version followed by a minimalist, contemplative version, reframes the same lyrics in ways that can be quite enlightening. Some folks blitz through every lyric verbatim, and others take more liberties, sitting on a particular refrain and letting it speak for a while.
I find that frequently, after the 5th or 6th listen through a psalm, something completely different jumps out at me than at the first time. And that is what the meditation literature of the Bible is all about, right? The word of God has layer upon layer of meaning and truth to dive into, and this practice has made it fun.
The playlist is linked here: Super-Extraordinary Survival Infinity Time
Here it is embedded to the site:
It grows as I continue to move forward through the Psalms. Hopefully someday it will cover the whole book.
Regarding Survival
This practice has been such a huge lifeline over the past few months of COVID times. It has helped me connect with God through the Psalms in ways that sometimes feel fresh, sometimes stale, but always available.
I don’t know about you guys, but the past few months I feel like I reach the end of myself frequently. Even earlier today, as my mind is drawn to worry of the stresses of packing, election outcome uncertainty, and COVID’s ongoing effects on the world, Psalm 20 hits me hard. “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord, our God.” I can spend an hour repeating that one refrain, replacing “horses” and “chariots” with all the other things I am tempted to trust in.
Here is an example Psalm 20 song from today:
One of my good friends, Aarik, preached at the beginning of 2020 an introduction on how a Christian today can read/interact with the Psalms. The manuscript of his teaching (and a link to the audio) is linked here and the audio of his teaching is linked here. I encourage you to check it out if you are interested. It has been so helpful for me to be reminded that the Psalms give us Christians the permission to bring to God our whole selves. Sadly, much of Christian culture in America has great fears about approaching God with either deep thoughts or deep feelings. But we are meant to have both.
One other eye opening thing that Aarik mentions: we are not intended to feel like we can confidently sing the psalms and mean every lyric on our own. Whether the suffering of the psalmist is too big for us to identify with, or the psalmist’s claim of blamelessness feels too bold, in those moments we don’t have to imagine ourselves singing these songs, but Jesus being the one who can sing them for us. I wish I could say more about this, but I have to explore it deeper firsthand.
I invite you to dive a little deeper with me! Use the playlist, make your own, or do something completely different. Let me know how it goes for you, and how I can improve at curating this list. Please also send any favorite songs or artists I can check out to help expand the list too!
Some recent favs:
Jon Foreman Killing it with Psalm 23:
Ben & Noelle Kilgore with a beautiful Psalm 26:
Greg Lafollette singing Psalm 27. God has consistently used this psalm to carry me through 2020, more than any other piece of scripture. Wait for the “I am sure of this” chorus. It’s money:
Park Church Music has an entire EP dedicated to psalm 32. All of it is worth a listen, but the first track feels great:
Extra deets about the playlist:
This is my second time doing a playlist like this. But the previous one was less systematic, and done when I felt like it. The list would include a series of 10 psalms in a row, then I would pause a while and have a 20 psalm gap in between adding. This is an attempt at finding a sampling of what is out there for every psalm. Far from exhaustive, there are many many songs that show up in a search that I don’t add.
Admittedly, this list is missing a lot, and I know it. Most of my list consists of songs titled “Psalm __” and I am missing more of the nuanced renditions that have subtler titles. Those that I know of, I try to add in. If you, reader, know of certain renditions of psalms that I should add in the list, I would love to add them.
Artist Highlights:
Poor Bishop Hooper: Every week they release a psalm put to music. I don’t know if this started with 2020 or with COVID, but what a great time to start! There are other folks who did a similar project like this, trying to make a song out of every psalm. I don’t fit their aesthetic tastes as well (“My Soul Among Lions” and “The Psalms Project”
Streetlights: Simply a spotify artist/group creating electronic loopy beats with folks dramatically reading scripture over it. Always provides an interesting tone to the scripture. I decided pretty early on to feature their psalm first every time as an intro to the day. Sometimes it feels a little much, but I appreciate what they are doing. I don’t know if they have done this for the whole Bible yet, but it is only a matter of time. Honorable mention: the psalms included in Keith Fowler Jr’s “Smooth grooves Bible” album make me smile.
Other frequent appearances: “Enter the Worship Circle” makes me smile when they break out the occasional rainstick in the background. “Shane and Shane” keep doing nice things too.